Incredible Shadows 2 - Bust Up
by eisceire
Summary: How not to handle a teen daughter with superpowers. Rating for mature themes; no sex, no death & not much violence; least not the physical kind.


**____****AUTHOR NOTE »»» Fear not! The story has a start, a middle, an end and all in the right order. It's even complete. Gentle Reader; you can take all of this tale (and all of it in one hit too) and it'll stand up for itself, all by itself. It does better in company though. Read the rest of Incredible Shadows and, even, Metroville Two-Step; if you want to add depth to each piece and add them all together for a bigger story.**

Helen took a deep, deep breath and counted up to a hundred as the house shook roughly; her darling husband was certainly home and, though she loved him truly, dearly, deeply, she still wished that he'd rein back his strength when he'd a rage on him. She knew what this was about well enough but that surely wasn't going to make it any easier. Most of the family knew what it was about as well, in fact and that most definitely hadn't made the matters a bit easier. Dash simply hadn't let up at all, with the « Who's going to be in trooooubbbble when dad gets home. » till Violet was properly fit to murder him and Helen didn't even want to begin to consider how very likely a prospect that was.

One thing you could say about her hubby, however: he was always straight to the point and the point today was what it ws that the kids had been up to when in town: naturally, nothing at all the kind of thing other parents had to worry over of course ... those parents hadn't little treasures that would suit up and break out an array of superpowers to fight crime and mayhem. They'd done quite well by themselves today in fact and she really was proud of them. It had been a minor incident, not a natural catastrophe or even a superfoe; just some ordinary, human villains but a lot of them, with heavy firepower, plenty of innocent bystanders and indoors. Dashiell and Violet, or Dash and Bubbles when costumed, had taken out the entire gang by their ownsome with only one, tiny piece of property damage, no harm to any bystanders or themselves and a hundred percent clean-up rate. By all accounts they'd left to spontaneous applause from everybody who'd been there, except the villains of course and a particular handful of those villains especially. That it was that was making dear daddy be so down on his daughter right now: the damage she'd had done to the poor, ickle, wickle, cwiminals.

Mr Incredible had been the very one who'd insisted every individual on the team had enough legal nous to know how to keep on Supering within the law or (as he had put it) « They packed us away once; never again! » and she had to agree with him there. The kicker was that the Supers still hadn't the legal immunity that actions by the other Emergency Services had and wasn't that all that they, ultimately, were ... an Emergency Service in fancy dress? The one cast iron defence they had was if they acted in self-defence; not that, in reality, you'd actually want to wait for the knife to be stuck in your gut before you hit back. Unless you were Violet that was; she was always the awkward one who the villains got that lethal edge over; which impelled her to fight back till they were immobilised, incapacitated or in the morgue.

Violet, Invisigirl had had to go from a standing start to giving a hundred and ten per cent when they'd faced off against Syndrome and she had struggled so hard to make the grade; with all her insecurities piled on top of her she hadn't just been fighting Syndrome ... she'd been fighting herself too. Violet had stepped up to the mark fantastically for the Incredibles; she was a human torch, she'd set herself alight for her family and the greater good ... for all that: Helen feared for her girl more than for any of the others; there was so very much, still, that could dampen the child's spirit, put out that new spark — Helen hated that her girl had to always be full on as a Super and to suffer so many mishaps but it was, oh so clear, that if Violet slackened off in the least she'd falter and fail; lose all that she'd gained.

It was a worry but you just couldn't have things all ways: could not go full throttle and soft pedal; could not stay legal and stay safe, or hold back yet win out. Life was scarcely as simple as it had been when Helen had first set out her stand as a Super; nowadays they had to perpetually thread Scylla and Charybdis ... each one alone in that endeavour in every action they undertook and some were simply better at walking the tightrope than others, while Violet fell off every single time.

Mr Incredible Parr, bless him, hadn't a suspicion of these subtleties; he had a family, a team with talents and he wanted, expected those talents to be used, to shine out, to be respected and admired. He never once had or would understand why it might not be fair or right for Dash to thrash all the superless sprinters he competed against; that, whatever way an athlete was enhanced (by drugs or surgery, genes or powers), it ploughed up the level playing field they were meant to be competing on. In the same way he couldn't at all see why a daughter with the least tangible and least offensive assets of them all might feel to need to push herself as hard as she could go, not to be modulating or moderating herself in missions. Violet, mused Helen, was one mixed up kid; a true Jekyll and Hyde: you just couldn't say which strand of her persona would be dominant ... except that when she and her father clashed it was always like a hurricane meeting a typhoon.

Typically, once Violet had been read the riot act, she came right back in with: « _We're all fashion victims dad, Edna made you into Bobbo the Clown, moms are ten for a cent in the burbs and I'm always invisible girl. No sir we're not Incredibles Incognito! Look at me, do you see Force Bubbles here; I don't think so._ ». It was hardly a speech made to mollify the man; as he made clear: « _Have you any idea at all what the body count of your bubbles was today? Do you even know how many lives you've wrecked, crashing around the way you do? You don't see your mother and me letting our tags run our lives; do you! » _

It was an old argument, a staple part of the diet of family rows but Violet still bit:_ « You mean like I'm two years old! Why'd I get stuck with the kindergarten name? You could call Jack Jack that. I could be Incredigirl. »_ « _No; no, no, no. No more Incredi girls or boys or dogs or whatever!_ » Incredidad exclaimed. Meanwhile, Helen tried to pour oil on stormy waters, as she chucked Violet under the chin and soothed: « _You know how hard it is to get the right tag, sweetling, I was only a bit older than you when I started out as Elastigirl and now I'm, well, not a teen anymore and a married mom too. Sure, you didn't get to pick; people put the tag on you but that's good, it means they're thinking about you._ » « _Why did it have to be Bubbles, though?_ » Violet protested as Dash made his contribution: « _Mom's elastic, Dad's incredible, I'm dashing and you go _**_pop_**_!_ » ... Dash produced the full sound effects and Violet was raging: « _You so don't know what I can do, you've no idea; I've been training with Edna. She told me: I've got powers; light and energy, you can do anything with them if you're smart_. » Dash was entirely unimpressed as he mocked: « _Oh Darlinck, violet is SO last season, try tartan, juzzt for me. Yeah. Right. Buuuuubles what can you do? What? What? What've you got? Speed, Flight, Teleportation, Super Strength, X Ray Vision, Ghostify, Death Ray, Mind Control, Magnetism, Animal Talk_? » Violet was sarcastic: « _Keep the speed, I don't want a flea up my butt; yes, yes, aye, uh huh, yeh, yep, yup; as if, I'm not Metaman. Sure I can talk to animals, I'm talking to you; aren't I? I can do myself in tartan and illusions too; want an illusion of my fist up your nose!_ »

_Their father had had quite enough by now: « Violet! Nobody's interested in what you think you can do. I know what you get up to. I was there; I saw your dodges myself. What happened to that gunsel was d ... isgusting ». _He'd been going to say «deliberate» but managed to turn the word aside at the last second. He had seen the fatal incident from its start to the gunsel's finish. It was far too close a call to say if Violet had meant what happened to happen or not and that was a conversation he didn't even want to have with himself right now. Much better to focus on immediate matters.

_« If you can't use the powers you have responsibly perhaps you shouldn't use them at all._ » That was a foul ball for sure but Violet pitched it right back: « _What! We're the most responsible family in America. Here's Little Miss Disappear, her super power is keeping the family secret. There's the human cheetah making out he's the human snail and I'm ... I'm Guyless Girl. Don't worry about me having dates dad; like you said those eggshell guys break too easy. Maybe I should date you dad; you're the guy for me; I'd sure like to, you're the only hero I know. We wouldn't even have to worry about having kids like you and mom do, as all the energy I throw out has me sterilised ... yeh I heard you and mom talking; when were you going to let me in on that surprise? Or maybe you were too busy figuring out how to get your It now you're single beds!_ »

« SILENCE »

Violet crumples to her knees; curls up: « _OH! — Get away from me! — All of you! _»

Violet energy blossoms; a ball that swells to fill the room; that sends the family flying through the Open Plan. Silence ... just the creak and crack of furniture shattering; explosions of timber; tintinnabulations of glass; hailstorms of plaster. The shriek and groan of bricks and mortar stressed to their limits. Doors planing through the air. Lintels, jambs and cills javelining across space. Fizz and fume of electrics shorting, overloading, burning. Walls and ceilings curve, bulge, belly outwards, billow upwards. Bedrooms become hills, basements are cave ins. RSJs spang and zing; rubber bands tensed too far.

Elastigirl expands, extends; entwines herself around doorways, corners, columns ... attempting to encapsulate the epicentre of chaos ... to contain, compress, control the devastation, the destruction, the daughter. It isn't enough, it isn't a fraction of nearly enough: the sphere surges, swells; stretches the superstructure; strains the super to snapping point. All of the energy and effort, all of the strength and power Elastigirl has poured into the pandemonium has been as effectual as a water pistol against a supernova. She hasn't slowed the shell by the slightest scintilla and is fast being pressed to the point of puncture for her plasticity.

Mr Incredible is as infuriated and as empowered as he ever has been; that his daughter would think this, say this, do this. Not once, ever, in all of his engagements with Syndrome has he felt the explosive, atom bomb of energy that is driving him now: not against the first robot nor the second, not when he hostaged Mirage nor when he hurled the car. If he's thinking of his daughter at all it is as an ingrate, a turncoat, a third columnist threat to his family, their existence, their home, the life they've built up. Every iota of this ire and energy is pounded into the sphere with one handed, two handed, double fisted blows and for all it achieves it might as well be snow falling on a furnace.

Dash, smallest and lightest of the family threesome has been flung the furthest; been favoured with the fullest view of the action but, for all this, he can find no opening, no opportunity to overturn the tide of events. Worse even than that is that he can see Jack Jack asleep in a cot in a kitchen about to collapse like a house of cards. He plays the card of last resort for all small boys, be they Super or not; he yells for mom and dad. They are far too busy to hear him or heed him however. Thankfully his big sis isn't so far away or so far removed; the hue and cry reaches her; the needs of her family penetrate the bubble about her in the way nothing else could. Violet drops her defences, drops the sphere, drops everything and droops, dismal and apologetic: _« Mom, Dad I'm sorry; I didn't mean to make such a mess; I'll make it up to you._ » They say nothing; they hardly know what to say; they can barely speak to her: « _Go to your room young lady, we'll talk later; right now I'm not even sure I know who you are. _» That stings, it cuts deep and Violet can barely get out more than a few words before mounting the stairs: « T_hat's not fair; you never give me a chance to be me. Well, fine; you won't have any more trouble from your Violet_. »

With that Violet shut herself away in her room; where she sat and gazed stonily out of the window for a long time, as tears dried on her face and the burning in her chest dulled to an ache. She murmured to herself: « _No. You won't have any more trouble ... not from Violet Parr. _ » and a vivid glow gathered itself around her clenched fists, where it burned for a very long time.


End file.
